Once a Rising Star, Chef Now Feeds the Hungry of India

Narayanan Krishnan was a bright, young, award-winning chef with a five-star hotel group, short-listed for an elite job in Switzerland. But a quick family visit home before heading to Europe changed everything.

Krishnan visited a temple in the south Indian city of Madurai. “I saw a very old man eating his own human waste for food,” Krishnan said. “It really hurt me so much. I was literally shocked for a second. After that, I started feeding that man and decided this is what I should do the rest of my lifetime.”

Now 29, he has served more than 1.2 million meals over the last 2 years — breakfast, lunch and dinner every day — to India’s homeless and destitute, mostly elderly people abandoned by their families and often abused.